


Moving Forward

by Shamelessly_Radiant, smutty_claus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-29
Updated: 2019-01-29
Packaged: 2019-10-18 21:29:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17588762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shamelessly_Radiant/pseuds/Shamelessly_Radiant, https://archiveofourown.org/users/smutty_claus/pseuds/smutty_claus
Summary: The 5 times they have to share a table and the one time they choose to.





	Moving Forward

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nightfalltwen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightfalltwen/gifts).



When Hermione was seven years old, she discovered _books._ She had learned to read on school already, and of course she could spell her entire name, and she was on her way to know all the multiplying tables, but up until that Christmas, she hadn’t really found joy in reading. She preferred doing her homework and then playing with her stuffed animals or drawing.

 

But her grandmother gave her a copy of _The tale of Peter the Rabbit_ , a book she herself had loved in her youth, and Hermione fell in love.

 

Books became her best friends. The ones she could always count on, and always have with her. There was, without fault, always a book in Hermione’s backpack. Books became her escape from the cruel elementary school playground, where she read quietly in the corners, or hidden in the bathrooms, until some teacher came to take them away from her, to berate her about playing with her playmates, while it was the other way around, and they avoided her.

 

Hermione learned that teachers could be as cruel as children, and she learned that her own autonomy was what mattered most to her.

 

And if there were books, then there was _tea._ There was nothing, _nothing_ , that could settle Hermione down more after a long and tiring day, and this too, stemmed from her grandmother, who would let little Hermione sit on her lap and take sips, pudgy hands wrapped around elegant porcelain, and hold it with her so it would not break.

 

In Hogwarts, there was nothing she would love more than sit with some light reading and a cup of tea, when the boys where away at Quidditch practice and her homework was long done.

 

So, when _Buns & Books _announced its grand opening end November, a book shop that would serve tea, she knew that she would have to go. She made the reservation, asked Ginny along, annotated the date neatly in her planner, and counted the days eagerly.

 

However.

 

Ginny fell ill with the flu, Kingsley asked her to take on a special case, and called her in for briefing just as she was about to leave, and then on the way out she ran into Luna, who was in the ministry to testify in a creature related case. Because Luna and she hadn’t seen each other in ages, Hermione stayed to talk to her friend. And then, to make matters _worse_ , she had to run back to get her scarf, because she was not ready to face the chilly November cold without it.

 

All this, made Hermione run late for the grand opening of _Buns & Books, _and— as the manager told her, repeatedly—even though they were _terribly_ sorry, the wait had been too long, and the place too understaffed, and nerves too frayed, to hold onto a reservation when said person was an hour late.

 

So, as instructed, Hermione took place on the bench, thought that Ginny _better_ be so sick she could not even move without repercussions, retracted that statement from her mind when she realised how horrible she sounded, and waited.

 

And _waited_.

 

Finally, a young frazzled girl approached her with a wide smile and profuse apologies, asking if it would be okay with her to share a table with someone.

 

“Sure,” Hermione smiled. She’d be reading and drinking tea, after all—she didn’t need a whole table for her alone. The girl looked so relieved Hermione was afraid she’d start to cry, but she composed herself and started to weave through the tables, with Hermione on her heels—

 

“I’m really very sorry, miss. We didn’t expect the turn out, and some tables haven’t arrived yet, and the place is generally _a mess_ —“ Hermione opened her mouth to reassure the girl, but stopped dead in her tracks when she caught the head of _very_ pale blonde hear—almost white really, at the table they were headed to.

 

The blonde man hadn’t caught on to their presence yet, engrossed as he was in a book, but ‘ _any moment now’_ thought Hermione, as the girl—Diana, Hermione read on a name tag she hadn’t noticed before—as Diana turned and with a confused glance at Hermione’s face asked: “Are you alright miss?”

 

Just at that moment, Draco Malfoy glanced up, and raised a perfect blonde eyebrow, the picture of perfect shock.

 

She hadn’t seen Draco Malfoy in five years. Yet, as they locked eyes, it seemed to Hermione that no time at all had passed.

 

“Is there a problem?” Diana asked, after an awkward silence, and Hermione, turned wide eyes on her. How could she _not_ know? Not know what the Malfoys stood for, had done in the war, and not know how she, and her companions, had been killed, locked up—

 

Yet, how could she know? She looked fresh out of Hogwarts. The war had ended, and this girl maybe hadn’t even been at Hogwarts at the time.

 

Malfoy had regained his composure, and had adopted a sprawl that made him look equally regal and bored. His book now lay closed before him on the table, and all of his attention was on her.

 

“Yes, Granger. Is there a problem?” he drawled, smirking slightly, but in his eyes were hard, cold and challenging.

 

She’d testified for the git. Harry for his mother. And even _Lucius Malfoy_ had been pardoned, because they had defected from Voldemort at the last minute—and, as speculated, because quite a bit of money had been involved, and the ministry had desperately needed it for reconstructions. And then the Malfoy’s had left England, no doubt to stay in their summer residence in France, maybe Italy, tanning and living on the considerable amount of money they still possessed, even after part of it had been seized as amendment for their crimes.

 

Diana looked between the two of them. “Look, I can see if I have another table for you, Miss, no problem—“

 

“It’s okay,” Hermione choked out, purposefully not sparing Malfoy even a single glance. “This table is fine.” And if she dumped her purse a little too hard on the table’s surface, no one said anything about it.

 

“Okay!” The girl said brightly, though she still looked between the two of them with a confused and a bit calculating air. Hermione didn’t want to know what she was imagining. She didn’t want anything anymore, but to get this over with. She had had half a mind to just turn and go home, but then Malfoy had given her the challenge, and she couldn’t back down now. She wouldn’t. She had come here for _books_ and she had come here for _tea_ and she would get them both, damn it.

 

“So, I’ll take your order now,” Diana said, as Hermione was sitting down and still very carefully not looking at the man in front of her, though she felt his gaze on her as though it burned, “and then you can go peruse the book section, find a book you’d like to read, and after you finish, you can buy it!”

 

Hermione raised her eyes to meet Diana’s, and remembered to smile when she saw her face faltering. “Thank you. I’ll take Earl Grey’s and a cinnamon bun, if you have it. A chocolate muffin otherwise.”

 

“One Earl Grey and Cinnamon bun coming up!” Diana chorused, turning and leaving.

 

Hermione breathed out, staring hard at the table top, deciding on what to do. At last, she readied herself to stand back up and pick a book, when _he_ spoke.

 

“What? Not even a hello? I expected better of you, Granger.”

 

Hermione raised her eyes and met Draco’s grey ones.

 

  
_-4_

 

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.” Her free three hours on Thursday afternoon, and _this_ is how she should spent them?

 

She watches icy grey eyes raise to meet hers. “My exact sentiments to be sure, Granger. Have you come to yell at me a bit more?”

 

Hermione flushed, recalling exactly how their last encounter had ended— with the both of them storming out after their discussion had heated. She couldn’t understand how Malfoy could be so blasé about it, when she had shoved her arm under his nose, almost crying, and had said _“This is what I remember every time I see your face, Malfoy. So yes, I still blame you. You didn’t do it, but you might as well have, because you and your parents stood next to me and did nothing. You were only pardoned because you didn’t have the guts to kill Dumbledore, and because your mother loved you enough to lie to Voldemort about Harry being dead or alive— and your father only got out because of Narcissa too. If you ask me, he should’ve rotted away in Azkaban. And no, I do not believe for a second that you’ve changed.”_

 

Malfoy had only bowed his head and walked away, leaving Hermione confused and feeling cold, feeling as if she had given too much of herself away, before she simply had apparated away on the spot. She’d cried herself to sleep that night.

 

“Is there a problem?” the waiter asked, looking between the two of them. This time a young man, without name tag. Probably forgotten somewhere in the back. She wondered how long it’d take him to notice it missing.

 

“No, no. I just remembered I have somewhere else to be,” Hermione said brightly, pulling her mittens back out of her bag, “so sorry to bother you—“

 

“Actually, I’ll leave,” Malfoy said, standing up. His chair, annoyingly, made no sound at all. “You can have the table, Granger.”

 

“No, that’s okay, really, I’ll come back some other time,” Hermione murmured, backing away from the table, still digging in her purse, now in search of her scarf.

 

Malfoy grabbed her wrist suddenly, and Hermione looked up, taking in his tight face, his clenched jaw. "Granger.” He all but growled.

 

“Malfoy.” Hermione set her jaw, raising her brows at him.

 

“You’re still equally stubborn, aren’t you?”

 

“And you still can’t take a no.”

 

“Sit down.”

 

“No.”

 

“Sit.”

 

“No.”

 

“Uptight, little swot,” He murmured.

 

“Git.”

 

“You’re impossible, do you know that?”

 

“ _I’m_ impossible?” Hermione nearly shrieked, and winced at the noise her own voice had made. She looked around to see if anyone had noticed, and sure enough, the people next to them were looking at them cautiously. She also noted that their waiter had disappeared, and thought, a tiny bit amused, that she couldn’t blame him.

 

“We’re making a scene, Malfoy. Let me go.” She thought for sure that would work on him, knowing how much the Malfoys valued their reputation, but his eyes never strayed from hers, and she watched him measure her, and seemingly come to a decision.

 

“I apologise,” he said, finally letting her go, and turning away.

 

“Wait, _wait_ ,” Hermione snapped, grabbing his arm to turn him back. At his sharp intake of breath, she noticed it was his left wrist she had grabbed, and let it go as if she’d been burned. His eyes climbed up from his arm to her, and he raised a brow, expectant.

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Well, Granger, usually, when one apologises, it means one expresses regret for something done or said.”

 

“Ugh!” Hermione nearly stamped her foot. “I’m not asking for a definition, Malfoy, I’m asking what you _mean._ ”

 

He considered her carefully, and at last sighed, and gestured to their empty table. Hermione, after a moment of hesitation, sat down, and Draco followed.

 

When she went home, much later, bundled up against the cold, she recalled the way he hadn’t quite met her eyes as he talked about towers and choices, and the set of his jaw the one time she had interrupted him. Her tea had gone cold, the fragile porcelain clutched between her hands slowly giving off less warmth, as she had been too raptured listening to remember drinking from it. Neither of them had bothered getting a book to read.

 

And that evening, alone in her apartment. She thought. About standing on that same tower. She had listened, and now she thought. And suddenly, she realised that she could not recall the last time he had called her a Mudblood.

 

Harry was the way to go.

 

.

 

“How are you, Hermione?” Harry murmurs in her ear, and if her smile is a little too brittle, and his hug a little too tight, neither of them says anything about it. “Come on in!” He grins brightly, “let me show you the place.”

 

The place he— _they_ got after Harry and Ginny decided to take a break, and Hermione broke up with _him_ and saw him for the last time.

 

“Is he here?” Hermione asked, vacillating on the front step of the dingy apartment.

 

If the look Harry levels on her is judgemental or understanding, Hermione will never know. It is gone too quickly too find out. “No, he’s helping George out at the shop.”

 

Hermione breathes out a sigh and steps inside. The apartment reminds her a lot of living with her boys during the war. And Ron’s stuff is _everywhere._ A quidditch poster. His favourite mug. And a Canons sweater- it had been a gift, from her. Hermione closes her eyes tightly, wondering if this was a good idea after all. “How… how is he?”

 

Harry’s eyes soften. “He’s quite well. And—“His eyes suddenly look damp. Hermione looks away discretely as he lifts his glasses to wipe at his eyes. He doesn’t have to finish the question for her to understand.

 

“She’s good. Enjoying her travels with Luna.” Privately she thinks Ginny went along not so much for the creatures but for the breath-taking landscapes and the way of travelling. By broomstick. Hermione had gotten the offer to come along, but there was too much she wanted to do, too little patience to deal with Luna’s quirks—even if she had finally let go of her world of make belief, unlike her father; and most of all, the broom trip.

 

“That’s good.” He breathes, “that’s good.” His shoulders shake for a moment, but then he composes himself, and Hermione wonders again why love is always so complicated.

 

“Anyways,” Harry asks, “sit, let me take your coat! Do you want something to drink?”

 

Hermione giggles. “Look at you, all proper as a host. You even put up the Christmas tree already!” Privately, Hermione thinks the decoration could be classier, but with two men, allowances should be made.

 

“Well, it is December.” He bows exaggeratedly. “Milady”

 

Hermione bows back. “Sir. What do you offer?”

 

“Err. Water, milk and err… water and milk? Oh no wait. I think the milk has gone bad.”

 

“There is the Harry I know and love again.” Hermione jokes, as Harry looks fake-angry at her.

 

“Oh! Wait, I just remembered.” He disappears into the kitchen, to reappear moments later with a very dusty bottle of butterbeer. “From the move,” he grins, all disarming and well _Harry_ and so Hermione can do nothing but accept.

 

“So,” He asks, moments later, having found another equally dusty beer bottle in the back of a kitchen cupboard (or rather—having accioed it, only to have it break his glasses. Hermione’s sides still ached a bit from the laughing), “what did you want to talk about?”

 

Hermione breathes in, and tries not to wince at the way his eyes widen when she answers: “About Draco Malfoy.”

 

  
_-3_

 

Books & Buns put up their decorations too, lovely fairy lights illuminating the place, and a huge tree, silver, red, gold and green combined. Even the cupcakes have little stars on them.

 

It is Diana again. She smiles brightly at Hermione, only for her small to fall quickly as she looks around. Hermione follows her gaze to a bright blonde head at the table and smiles at the irony. At the near recognition of this moment. “It’s fine,” she tells Diana, and sits down at Draco’s table. He looks up slowly, and his face becomes incredulous when he sees her sitting there. She smiles at him, wide, just a little forced, but genuine.

 

He grimaces—“Don’t, _don’t_ give me that smile.”

 

She stops smiling, scowling, but sits down anyways. “Which smile?”

 

“That” he waves at her face, “slightly deranged grin you give people whenever you are pleased with them.”

 

“I do not look deranged!” she snaps, giving him a glare instead, which oddly makes him look more comfortable. Though maybe not oddly, Hermione thinks. This is after all, known territory for them. Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger do not smile at each other.

 

But she’d wanted to. Because Harry had told her about repentance, wavering wands and attempts at build ups. Quiet donations, anonymously made. A wandless sentence sat out patiently. The fact that he no longer lived in the manor. A past relationship with Astoria Greengrass, a girl who had been key that seventh year Dumbledore’s army had put up resistance at the castle—

 

The fact that Malfoy had never outright told his parents it was them at his manor, though his resistance had been rather pathetic. The fact that he had never uttered the word _Mudblood_ again since that night.

 

Malfoy was lounging now, but she could sense his grey eyes scrutinising her. Could see him tense, and waiting.

 

She did not know this man. She had known a spoiled boy— and that was not an excuse, was it. There were never excuses, but there were always _reasons_. His heritage, his parents, loving but flawed, prejudiced, _wrong._ She did not know this man. But she had seen a boy grow up, for seven years, had seen him become a still, tired young man after his father had been put in Azkaban. Had seen him become still and horribly terrified, on a mission no sixteen year old could complete. She had seen him pale and desperate, in the height of the war, to save his family— the Malfoys, for all their flaws, had one redeeming quality: they loved each other. It is what had ended the war, what had turned the victory in their favour: Narcissa’s love for her son. A mother’s love had ended the war twice, that way. A mother’s love had defeated Voldemort twice. A Mudblood’s sacrifice, a Pureblood’s lie, something Tom Riddle had never understood.

 

And he had seen her grow up too, hadn’t he? Had seen her bossy, bookish and know-it-all, across the divide in the Great Hall, across their houses and the respective colours on the hems of their robes. He had seen her tired, and afraid, and screaming on his Manor’s floor. One of the many monstrosities committed in the place he had grown up in, the place he had once called home, and had been loud, spoilt and unafraid in. Had been a child in— and the war had stolen that from him, as it had stolen hers too, by her own choice, the wand she had turned onto her parents.

 

God, she felt old. She was merely 25, but her generation had had to carry so many things. Had had to say goodbye to so many people. She thought about people like Minerva McGonagall, living through a war not once, but twice, and all the things they’d done and lost. She thought of Severus Snape, living a lie his whole life. She thought of Harry, and all the people he’d lost, and the way he had almost died twice, and still come back, and the way they were all still living, trying and mostly succeeding to be happy, saying goodbye to the flinch in their spines, learning to be loud again, even though the phantom pains and the way they searched for lost people in the crowds would probably stay with them for a long time.

 

She didn’t know this man. Didn’t know the flinch in his bones, or the way he had experienced the war. But she thought she’d like to.

 

I’m Hermione Granger,” she said, reaching a hand across the table. “It’s nice to meet you.”

 

She kept her hand up while Malfoy’s eyes met hers, incredulously. She kept it up while his eyes travelled from hers to her hand and back again. She kept it up while he sat there, still, incredulous. She kept it up until he started to look away.

 

 _Well then._ Hermione, suddenly embarrassed and furious with herself, started to pull back her hand, wondering why she’d ever thought this would have been a good idea. To make peace with _Draco Malfoy._ She could feel the blood rise to her cheeks as she started to look away, ready to get her stuff, when suddenly, rapidly, Draco’s long fingers wrapped around her still half outstretched hand.

 

“Draco Malfoy,” he murmured. “Though you’ll always be Granger to me, Granger.”

 

She snorted, amused despite herself, and leaned back in her chair. She wondered why he’d waited so long. Maybe he doubted her sincerity, and had only been convinced after her rejected look, her righteous anger, the blush that lighted her cheeks. Maybe he’d hesitated, thinking about their shared pasts.But no matter the reason, they’d done it. Reached past shared hatred and different values, or maybe just past a table top, and had taken her hand.

 

 _This,_ was some sort of progress.

 

By the time Hermione had settled down enough, reheated her cold and forgotten tea with a flick of her wand, had absentmindedly ordered a slice of chocolate cake, Draco had picked up his book again.

 

She shoved her seat away from the table, but stopped, decided she’d rather have a conversation than read. She had to awkwardly shuffle and move back, but he didn’t look up, and Hermione reminded herself that it was only _normal._ Nervously, she wiped some crumbs of the table, debated what to say. _I didn’t know you liked to read? —_ But that’d be stupid, considering he had been here every time she had been. _So, what have you been up to?_ — But that might come off as too accusing. “What are you reading?” were the words that came out instead, and she winced when she noticed that she just needed to tilt her head a bit to catch the title. But she had said it, so now she waited, holding her ground with bated breath, waited until the man before her lowered his book, met her eyes and replied.

 

  
_-2_

 

“The system is broken,” she says, hotly, gesturing wildly, and doesn’t notice a bit of her beverage sloshing out of the cup until she sees Draco’s eyes follow the liquid’s path.

 

“Of course it is,” he drawls, sitting back in his chair. “It’s a government, Granger, _inherently_ so.”

 

“Cynic.”

 

“Realist.”

 

She snorts. “There’s a difference between realism and pessimism, Malfoy.”

 

“It still doesn’t change the fact that I’m right.” He shrugs.

 

She narrows her eyes at him. “At least I am willing to do something about it.”

 

“I never said I wasn’t. I just don’t think a complete overhaul of the system, flawed though it may be, is the solution you’re looking for. There is no such thing as a utopia.”

 

“I know that,” she says, “off course I know that. But that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be _improved_.”

 

“Of course it could be improved,” he agrees easily. “I simply think that working from within the system is a much more promising way to achieve that improvement. Society just went through a war, Granger, I don’t think it has the energy to revolutionise its government right now.”

 

He is right. She is coming to realise, lately, more and more what a sharp mind he has. He sees the world so very differently, but he _thinks_. In their childhood it had been put mostly to use for schemes and hurtful wit, and she strangely regrets never knowing this side of him. But they’ve been making up for it with longer and longer coffee breaks.

 

“Say I’d do that. Work from within the system. How do you propose I work towards a fairer system from a system that is, itself, so very unjust and biased – that’s just a ludicrous idea.”

 

“And barging into that unjust and biased system demanding a change is equally so.” Draco leans back, eyes sparkling. He is right, and he knows it too. She must look frustrated and tired, because his eyes soften. “Politics require a lighter touch— if the system is corrupt and underhanded, some allowances must be made.”

 

Her eyes narrow, and she leans forward. “By being underhanded too, you mean.”

 

He raises his eyebrows, gives her a _look_ that means _well, exactly._

 

“ _Slytherin_.”

 

His lips twitch. “Gryffindor,” he says, gesturing at her. “And here I thought we were not stating the obvious.”

 

She shakes her head. “No. No. The end do not justify the means. If I do that kind of thing, I allow myself to become corrupt as well. Then I’ll be just as bad as they are. Then I’d hardly be setting an example of what is right!”

 

“And if you _don’t_ do it, then you’ll get _nothing_ accomplished, and you’ll just ensure it will never change,” his body language is rigid now, his tone harsh. “Is that the better alternative?”

 

“I need to be able to live with myself and my choices afterwards, so yes, it is. I am the only one that can make myself better or worse, and I need to prevent the second option from happening!”

 

She remembers the locket, whispering poison into her skin, wrapping it up in shiny gold and offering it up on a silver platter. _Ambition, determination, you’ll get it done with just a little cunning, just take it Hermione, just reach up for that apple and take a_ ** _bite._**

 

“You’d be surprised what you can live with, at the end of the day,” Draco murmurs, and leaves it at that.

 

  
_-1_

 

“But haven’t I done enough?” she asks, and hopes she doesn’t come off as whiny as she sounds. She found herself sitting in front of him yet again, but this time she didn’t really mind. _What did you want to do before the war?_ She found herself asking him, and suddenly here they were.

 

“Of course, you have. But I have a feeling that is not the question you should be asking yourself.”

 

“Oh?”

 

“I think the question is: was it enough for you?”

 

Hermione flounders. “Since when do you know me at all?” she murmurs, and sees him visibly soften. Suddenly, she wonders. About all this time they’re spending together. About how, when they cross each other he has taken to greeting her, and she has taken to smile at him. About how she has started to look forward to Thursday afternoons, and it hasn’t really felt like an obligation anymore to share his table. About how she has started to notice more of Draco than just his sharp mind. About how she has started to think of him as _Draco_ , instead of Malfoy, as a friend and even possibly… more.

 

Oh no. Oh no. She is in so much trouble. How did she not see this coming? Really, his mind alone would be enough for her to fall for, but adding his wicked humour and his good looks, she had been screwed from the get go, and she had allowed herself to be caught like a …

 

Distantly she registers that Dra- _Malfoy_ has stopped talking, and is waiting for her answer. She forces herself to meet sparkling grey eyes, opens her mouth, but all that comes out is “Huh?”

 

“I said, six years are enough to notice some things. Say are you all right, Granger? You look a bit warm.” And now he’s all concerned, and leaning over the table and she—

 

“I’ve got to go.” She almost yells, and barely manages not to trip her chair as she jumps up. She throws some money onto the table before turning to leave, not even fully dressed yet.

 

He follows her outside, in a controlled gait, managing for all the world to look perfectly put together and calm, when she is as rumpled as can be. She’s positively sure there must be a feather hiding in her hair somewhere.

 

“Granger. Granger.”

 

“I just—“

 

“ _Hermione_.” He snaps, grabbing her shoulders to whirl her around and he is suddenly so close. “What is the matter?”

 

She looks down at his lips, pink, soft perfect, and looks back up just in time to see understanding form in his eyes.

 

“I—“and she doesn’t get the chance, because his mouth is on hers, soft and moist and lovely, and though it is a first kiss, it is less awkward than the time Viktor pressed his mouth gently against hers and she didn’t know what to do, or the first time she and Ron kissed, teeth mashing together because there was _no time_ for patience in the middle of a war and they just wanted to get as close to each other as they could. This kiss is gentle, yet insistent, and she sinks into Draco’s chest with it.

 

A cold drop on her forehead startles her out of it, and she looks up to see white flakes dancing all around them in the air.

 

“It’s snowing!” she says, excitedly and notices Draco’s wild grin, and the fact that he hasn’t let go of her yet. His fingers brush a snowflake from her cheeks carefully, and her cheeks heat up like torches. “So it is,” he murmurs. “Now if we’d only have a mistletoe.”

 

She laughs, wildly, carefree, head thrown back and then sobers up, asks him: “what now?”

 

“Well. Short term, I was wondering if you’d like to take a walk with me. On a slightly longer term, I hope to be able to get some sense into your head, and see you move to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement instead of staying in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, where I’m sure you’ll get absolutely nothing accomplished.”

 

Hermione smiles. He’s nervous. He’s hiding it well, but she still can tell. He’s speaking slightly faster than usual, and his eyes are flicking a bit too intensely between hers. Maybe she knows him a bit too.

 

She takes his hand. “Fine,” she says, “to taking a walk. But the rest will all depend on if you take me on a date.” And lets the pleasantly surprising brightness of his smile steady her.

  


And well. Hermione has always found London lovely in the snow, but never as lovely as that evening.

 

  
_0_

 

“Do you want something to drink?” Hermione asks, turning and falters at his closeness.

 

Her breath catches in her throat at the way he crowds her slightly into the wall, gentle yet firm, and kisses her.Draco kisses her as if he is content to do that the whole night, and Hermione lets herself relax into it. She isn’t quite sure she is ready for more, yet, but she wants to just _enjoy_ and see where this leads. If she doesn’t feel like doing more, she’ll stop, and she is on contraception, never stopped even after breaking up with Ron, so she doesn’t need to worry—

 

Hermione decides to let go. And when Draco kisses down her neck and palms her breasts, she arches into him, and when he finds her nipples through her shirt she whispers “gently,” because they’re sensitive and he meets her eyes, heavy with lust, and listens, as he lets her set the pace.

 

She tugs at his hair to get him to kiss her again, and he bites at her lip in retaliation, before sliding his hands down to pick her up. “Wrap your legs around me, Granger,” he murmurs, before kissing her again.

 

She has to laugh when he bumps first into the table and then into the doorframe, even though she thinks it will leave a nasty bruise on her hip. He can kiss the pain away later (and he does). He lets go of her, and she falls onto the bed a lot less gracefully than she would have liked. Hermione kicks out her leg when he snorts with laughter, and Draco catches her ankle, giving it a warning squeeze. “Don’t _kick me_ ” he says petulantly, a ghost of thirteen year old him on his face.

 

“I’ll kick you as much as I li—“she gasps as he tugs and she falls back onto her back and he drags her towards him, but then, he is leaning over her and kissing her again, his hand a lot less patient now. He’s trying to tug her shirt off at the same time that she is trying to unbutton his, and both their hands are in each other ways. Draco decides instead to just slip his hands under her shirt, reaching at any skin he can. Her hips, her back, her stomach, and Hermione wonders at how intimate it feels to have him touch her there, even if those places are not really that intimate at all.

 

He tugs her to get her to sit up, and her shirt is gone before she has time to notice, as soon as she is done unbuttoning his. Her bra is gone too, and she hadn’t even realised he had unclasped it, before he pulled both garments off together. She raises her arms slightly, suddenly a lot self-conscious. Hermione has always been happy with her mind, and hasn’t dwelt too much on her body, besides keeping it healthy. Ron played Quidditch, but also ate to his heart delight, and though he definitely hadn’t been too big (neither of them were) he had had the same softness around his belly as Hermione did. Draco does not, all toned and muscled, and Hermione thinks about the stretch marks on her breasts and about her tummy is not quite completely flat until he cups one breast, and flicks a thumb over a nipple, gently, like she had told him before.

 

When she looks up, his eyes are on hers, and he is completely still and _waiting._ It is only when she lowers her arms that he looks down, to his hand on her breast, and asks, “Is this okay?”

 

Hermione nods, and not sure he saw, whispers “yes.” He smiles, and he must think her eager, but he wouldn’t be completely wrong.

 

She closes her eyes and lets herself fall back again, and he trails his hands down her sides, leaving shivers in their wake. “Is this okay?” He asks, with his hands on the button of her jeans, and she reaches out a hand to stroke the fringe out of his eyes before she traces a path to his shoulders, to brush of the unbuttoned shirt he is still wearing. She then trails her fingers to his right nipple, circling it, with her eyes very intent on the path her fingers are making, and he shudders and exhales heavily, his hand still against her jeans.

 

When she brushes two fingers against the front of his jeans, he jerks back and opens her button with a renewed intensity, and kisses her again. His fingers soon find her centre, drawing out the heat there, skilfully tapping her clit, and pushing in and out of her cunt while his lips explore every inch of her skin. He finds the spot on her right shoulder, scrapes his teeth over the skin there as his fingers fondle her nipple in just the right way and meanwhile his fingers go in-out, in-out, his thumb now circling and swiping her clit, until she, she—

 

She shudders up, her body tightening as she comes, and collapses boneless on the mattress, and Draco doesn’t waste time in kicking of his pants and lining up with her, and they both groan as he _finally, finally_ enters her there. He soon sets a fast rhythm, and Hermione tries to match as best as she can, and soon gives up on trying to touch him or kiss him, and just lets herself be swept away.

 

Draco’s hips snap twice more against hers before he shudders and comes, a pulsing warmth finding its way inside of her. He collapses on top of her, and she blinks, stroking his hair.

 

Afterwards, after the clean-up, he held her close, and she fell asleep smiling.

 

  
_+1_

 

“ _Robert_ ,” the woman— the manager, Hermione comes to realise, “don’t you know who this is?” The same boy from the second time, who forgot his name tag again, winces and squeaks out a “No?”

 

 _“You can’t put this two together at the same table,”_ the woman hisses out between a clenched teeth smile. “This is Hermione Granger. And _that_ is Draco Malfoy.”

 

And the difference in tone she uses for those two names is as vast as the width of the ocean.

 

Draco looks up, all clenched jaw and eyes twitching and so much tension in his face. His eyes cross hers and for a moment she sees tiredness, before it is gone, like it never was there at all. She wonders at that, at the fact that he let her see it at all.

 

“It’s quite all right,” he says as he stands. “I—“

 

Hermione darts forwards, taking his hand. “What he means to say is, he was waiting for me. You see, we agreed to meet each other here. If that’s no problem.”

 

The woman’s eyes are almost bugging out of her head, but she gets out an “off course not, not at all!” before she grips Robert’s arm in what seems to be a vice grip leading him away. “– and how many times do I need to remind you of your name tag?” Hermione hears, and then she looks up at Draco, who is still standing there frozen, and realises she is still holding his hand.

 

She lets go awkwardly, and his expression does not change.

 

“Draco, I—“

 

“Granger.” He interrupts. “Let’s get out of here. Please.”

 

“I, oh, all right.” She feels something akin to rejection start to bubble up, before he lays a hand on her cheek, asks her.

 

“Do you want to go back to my place? It’s pretty nearby.”

 

“What’s the incentive,” she asks, and luckily he snaps out of his mood, smiling. “What, is my company not enough?”

 

“Mmmh, you’ll have to convince me.”

 

“What about curiosity to see where the great Draco Malfoy lives?”

 

“You see, you were doing fine, until you implied you were great.” Despite this, she leans into him, ruining it.

 

He kisses her nose, eyes sparkling. “I’ll let you hold my hand the whole way there.”

 

“The _whole way?_ Now you’re spoiling me.”

 

“And—“ he heaves a long suffering sigh before he continuous: “I still need to put up the Christmas decorations.”

 

She _ooohs_ before she narrows her eyes at him. “How did you know—“

 

“That you love Christmas so much?” He took her hand and began pulling her along. “Let’s see. First, we had six years of overdone enthusiasm at Hogwarts—“

 

“Excuse, me, my enthusiasm is _never_ over—“

 

“Second, your mooning over the decorations at Buns & Books—“

 

“That’s because they’re cute!”

 

“And third, your reaction just now.”

 

That shuts Hermione up. And he is smiling so brightly, she supposes she can let him have it. Just this once.

 

(And if not, revenge is a dish best served cold, and _nothing_ is colder than her feet in bed.)

**Author's Note:**

> If the dialogue seems familiar, I admit, it's because it is. The conversations Draco & Hermione have are very heavily inspired by Devotion by acidpop25. I didn't realise it until it basically wrote itself, and it fitted too well in the story to change it. Since this is only fanfiction and I'm not making profit, I figured it wouldn't hurt too much, but did think I should mention it£.
> 
> If you enjoy, please leave a comment, or hit that kudos button!


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